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Bicycle Facility Documentation — Vrijenbanselaan

Post written by Bryan Blanc and Craig Baerwald

As part of our Sustainable Transport in the Netherlands course, Craig and I documented one segment of transportation facility and its bicycle infrastructure. The segment we examined was Vrijenbanselaan, a road that crosses a main bridge north of Delft’s City Center. See map below for contextual view of the segment within greater Delft.

Context Map

Because the facility cross section changes over the length of the segment, we made five cross sections. Below is a diagram depicting where the cross sections were approximately taken.

Section A includes cycletracks on both sides, the western side having a two-way cycletrack and the eastern side having a one-way cycletrack. These are dropped soon as the road approaches the bridge toward central Delft.

We broke up the north side intersection into two cross sections (B and C) because of its complexity. The north side (B) of the intersection is a total of 111′ of ROW (including sidewalks). It accommodates pedestrians, bikes, motor vehicles, and light rail transit in designated facilities.

The south side (C) of the intersection is 104′ wide, as one of the travel lanes is merged with the tram lane, and the corresponding median drops out.

Section D is north side ramp leading up to the bridge, and is a total of 53′ in width. The sidewalks are dropped, with a sidewalk on a local street on the east side absorbing pedestrian traffic traveling over the bridge.

Section E illustrates the cross section of the Reineveld Bridge, and is a total of 61′ in width. There is only a sidewalk on the east side of the bridge, which is connected with the local street sidewalk mentioned above.

Section F illustrates the approach to the southern intersection, and is 92′ in width. Sidewalks on both sides are restored.

This transportation facility represents a compromise between many different modes of transportation in their competition for street space. Light rail transit is given dedicated lanes at certain points (where there are medians), while motor vehicles can use the space as a passing lane when no transit vehicles are occupying the lane. Bikes are only accommodated with bicycle lanes throughout the facility, which is uncommon on many facilities we’ve ridden in the Netherlands; especially on a multi-lane road including a bridge.